The Science and the Lessons of Hurricane Sandy

The evening view from across the East River tells a tale of two cities: downtown Manhattan mostly shut down, without power, subways and most services; uptown Manhattan brightly lit, subways running, businesses and neighborhoods climbing back to some kind of usual.

In Brooklyn, families from relatively unscathed neighborhoods like Brooklyn Heights and Carroll Gardens gathered at PS 29 Thursday to donate food and supplies for the worse-off in flooded-out Red Hook. On the crowded morning commute across the bridges, with three people per vehicle now required, those with cars picked up strangers to come along for the ride. Stories like that pop up all around the boroughs: Two cities, coming together.

But the wake of Sandy is full of questions that will take awhile to answer, and that need attention from all of us:

Why did so much infrastructure fail? The storm challenged the power grid, the systems for food, water, sanitation and transportation. Can we rebuild it smarter?

Scores of people died, and hundreds of thousands were stranded in high-rises, or flooded and burned out of their homes. Is there a better way to build to protect people from such disasters?

Is there a connection between Sandy’s wrath and climate change? Should we expect more such storms in the future? What can we do about that?

How much will all this cost us?

What will be the cultural and political impact of this superstorm? In particular, will it affect the election next Tuesday?

Lower Manhattan, powerless, on Oct. 31. Photo: D. Funkhouser

There’s plenty of conversation going on about all this already. On the Connecticut public radio show “Where We Live,” on WNPR, Earth Institute Executive Director Steve Cohen joined others talking about building more resilient cities.

Earth Institute researcher Radley Horton spoke to Terry Gross on NPR radio’s “Fresh Air” about climate and the future after Sandy — what do rising sea level, warming oceans and disappearing Arctic sea ice have to do with it?

Oct. 31: Two days after Hurricane Sandy knocked out power to lower Manhattan and shut down the New York transit system, the city is struggling to recover. It’s hard to say yet how long that will take.

Klaus Jacob, a scientist with the Earth Institute, said the storm is a “wake-up call” for New York and other cities around the world to address aging infrastructure and better prepare for coastal flooding. The call comes in even louder if you consider the prospect of rising sea levels and more extreme weather events from global warming.

“We had one wake-up call last year under the name of Irene. We got away with less than we will most likely incur from Sandy,” Jacob said in an interview with the BBC. “The question is how many wake-up calls do we need to get out of our snoozing, sleeping, dreaming morning attitude? We have to get into action. We have to set priorities and spend money. For every one dollar invested in protection you get a return of four dollars of not incurred losses.”

Looking across the East River toward Manhattan from Brooklyn Heights, 3 p.m. Monday. Photo: D. Funkhouser

Jacob is one of many Earth Institute experts talking to the media about storm preparedness and the atmospheric science behind this devastating storm. Jacob also spoke to the Wall Street Journal about the difficulties faced by crews working to get the subway system back in service (see “Salt Water Puts Subway in Jeopardy”). And Adam Sobel, a professor of climate and atmospheric science, spoke on the Brian Lehrer show on WNYC.

Anthropologist Ben Orlove wrote for the CNN website about a survey he and colleagues are doing on how people perceive the threats from such storms — and how people can misunderstand the widespread potential for damage (as occurred last year in Vermont and upstate New York from Hurricane Irene).

If you’re into the science behind the storm, check out some other news coverage featuring Earth Institute experts.